Posts tagged “2012”

This was not the biggest competition that we’ve ran by any stretch of the imagination but with 112 competitor entries it was still big enough for the competitors to get some experience. We ran two areas and the officials did a great job as usual, they even managed to shave an hour off my guestimated finish time. We were all done and dusted by 1.15pm which meant a nice short day for everyone concerned.

The feedback has been really positive, especially since a lot of kids took away some great trophies in addition to the usual medals.

I’d like to personally thank everyone who came along and supported us this year, competitors, parents, instructors – I know it’s sometimes tough to get to and support everything that we’d like to but it really is appreciated.

I’m not going to talk about the achievements of TeamGB so far in the 2012 Olympics because I think they speak for themselves. I just thought I’d share this fantastic picture of a fantastic athlete, Jessica Ennis who got GOLD in the heptathlon today. Awesome.

It’s also interesting that TeamGB women are currently out performing the men too… hopefully inspiring millions in the process…

Just a final word, moments like these last forever, and they are well worth all the blood, sweat and tears behind the scenes.

This was only our second ever competition exclusively for our beginners. The event was held to be a stepping stone to some of our bigger competitions that we now run annually and was designed to be a low key affair, with none of the bells and whistles that we usually have at our events. We didn’t want to intimidate our inexperienced competitors. The event was also used as a training opportunity for our cadets to get some judging practise in. They all worked hard throughout the day and we’d like to thank them once again for their efforts.

The event started at 11am with Sensei Amy putting all the competitors through their paces, going over the kata moves they would need during the day. Overall the competition was quite relaxed, and we took our time between categories so that the young competitors could get themselves ready. Before the Kumite (fighting) categories started, we had an exhibition match between two of our Wadokai England squad members, Lewis and Phil. And Chris gave a demo of the Kick Master Kumite too.

It was great to see some great potential in the young-lings, with some as young as five years old already moving around the mat like they own the place. I think the future is bright for our club.

Results:

KA1 – Kata, White Belts, White & Red Belts

1st – Harry Newbury

2nd – Alfie Ogden

3rd – Sarah Shears

3rd – AJ Murray

KA2 – Kata, Red Belts

1st – Connor Shepherd

2nd – Tyler Vaughan

3rd – Jacob Hodgson

3rd – Leyton Davis

KA3 – Kata, Yellow Belts, Orange Belts

1st – Oakley Lindridge

2nd – Khushru Khasimai

3rd – Jack Solomon

3rd – Joseph Flounders

KA4 – Kata, Seniors

1st – Chris Lindridge

2nd – Roy Salmons

KM1 – Kick Master Kumite,

White & Red Belts

1st – Joshua Martindale

2nd – Alfie Ogden

3rd – AJ Murray

3rd – Will Davidson

KM2 – Kick Master Kumite, Red Belts, Yellow Belts, Orange Belts

1st – Rebecca Caygill

2nd – Joseph Flounders

3rd – Leyton Davis

3rd – Khushru Khasimai

KU1 – Kumite, White Belts,

White & Red Belts

1st – Harry Nebury

2nd – Harvey Allicante

3rd – Sarah Shears

3rd – AJ Murray

KU2 – Kumite, Red Belts

1st – Callum Pedley

2nd – Connor Shepherd

3rd – Jacob Hodgson

3rd – Tyler Vaughan

KU3 – Kumite, Yellow Belts, Orange Belts

1st – Oakley Lindridge

2nd – Abby Laidler

3rd – Rebecca Caygill

3rd – Khushru Khasimai

I know that some of the kids were disappointed that they didn’t manage to get medals, or they didn’t get as far as they’d hoped, but sadly, not everyone can win. I personally think that you can learn just as much from losing as you can from winning, perhaps even more and I was sure to remind all the competitors of this before we let them go home.

Finally, I’d like to thank all of the parents and students for entering the competition (especially on the same weekend as a club grading!), and all of the club officials and volunteers who helped fetch and carry the equipment (the dedicated few!) and also the Hartlepool Sporting Association and Hartlepool College of Further Education for the use of a fantastic venue.

As part of our clubs high performance program we look at a lot of factors. These range from the athletes themselves: how old are they? Weight, height, bmi, current conditioning, current ability etc… and also what their goals are for the coming year. Are they realistic? Or are they wanting to be world champion by the end of next week?

From this we look at what they need to do themselves, and what we as instructors need to do to help them achieve their goals.

We’ve started this process this year already for our competitive athletes. Some have shown an interest in attending Wadokai England squad training sessions with the aim of being selected to the team that competes in Venice in November.

We’ve looked at which competitions we as a club will be attending this year, and which ones each competitor should be entering in order to gain the most experience. We’ll be sitting down with each of them over the next week or so and agree which events they will be attending, and how often they are going to train each week. The athletes, instructors and parents will then agree and sign a contract based on this commitment.

This might seem a little excessive and not all clubs will be this strict but we will be investing a lot of time effort (and money) into each of our elite athletes to help them achieve their goals so we want to make sure everyone knows what they’re signing up for before hand.

This brings me to the title of this post. Tortoise or Hare? A few of the instructors were talking about this the other day and it has stuck in my head.

Which is better?

Those students who peak early and achieve a lot of things very young (e.g. under 16yrs) but then tend to drop out of the sport altogether? (Hare group)

Or…

Those who don’t peak so fast and maybe don’t achieve as much in the same period of time but are in Karate for the long term? (Tortoise group)

I personally believe that the latter is better for the sport/martial art in the long term. It is from this group that our future instructors will come from, not the first group.

It would also be interesting to see why the majority of athletes from the first group don’t stay in the sport… but that’s for another time.

NOTE: this post has been written whilst on an exercise bike at the gym so their might be typos…

We left Hartlepool two hours before dawn (approx 6am) on a very cold, wet and windy Sunday morning (22nd Jan). Ponds Forge in Sheffield was the venue of the 1st English Karate Federation Kyu Grade Karate Championships so, Sheffield was where we were heading!

Apart from being unable to find somewhere to park the mini-bus (gratefully borrowed from Hartlepool College of Further Education) the journey was uneventful. The competitors signed in and got changed, the parents tried to get comfortable on the seating and Lynne and Carl reported to the chief referee to find out where we would be working (Judging) all day. Amy (coach) then briefed the competitors and made sure they were ready for the day.

The day was pretty well organised and was done and dusted in about 9 hours, not bad for such a large entry! I think we could have easily shaved at least an hour off the day if it wasn’t for the usual time-wasting issues at competitions: kids not turning up when they’re supposed to, with incorrect equipment, occasional admin errors etc… but no competition is ever perfect.

This was the second time I’d helped judge at an EKF comp and a first for Lynne and we both thoroughly enjoyed it, even though it was like working in an oven – for 9 hours!!

The three competitors (Lewis, Phil, Bailey) that entered from our club did very well in Kata and Kumite despite the fact that this was the first EKF competition any of them had entered. We entered expecting zero medals, we just wanted to get some competitors on the mat as early as possible so that we had something to work on early in the season.

Results are as follows:

Phil Salmons: 3rd Place – Team Kumite, Boys 12-13yrs

Lewis Muldown: 3rd Place – Team Kumite, Boys 12-13yrs

Lewis Muldown: 3rd Place – Individual Kumite, Boys 12-13yrs -45kg

Bailey Reed: 3rd Place – Team Kumite, Boys 12-13yrs

Bailey Reed: 3rd Place – Individual Kata, Boys 12-13yrs

Bailey Reed: 2nd Place – Individual Kumite, Boys 12-13yrs +45kg

We got back to Hartlepool at about 9.30pm making it a mammoth 15.5 hour day and the longest ‘Karate day’ our trio of competitors have faced so far.

Key Learnings: The competitors need to work on keeping energy and hydration levels constant throughout the day by eating and drinking correctly to ensure peak performance.

Summary: We were a little disappointed to only field 3 competitors at this event despite having a pretty big club, those that didn’t attend missed a great opportunity to get some time on the mats. There is still a lot of work to do with all three competitors in Kata & Kumite but each performed well and if they keep up the hard work and enthusiasm then the future should be bright for them.

All Karate classes at Belle Vue re-start from Friday 6th January and Owton Manor re-start from Monday 9th January. Throston After School re-starts from Friday 13th January.

Training Course

We’ve also got a Start of Year Course on Saturday 16th January at Belle Vue Sports Centre, 12-3pm, £5.00. Open to all club members. – This is a great way of getting rid of the cob webs from the holidays.

Club Membership – Important

Club membership renewal forms will be handed out over the next few weeks, these need to be completed in full (to ensure all details are up to date) and returned with the renewal fee by the end of the month. Everyone will then be issued with an information pack with all important info relating to the club (policies etc…) that we follow, including guidelines on what you do if you’ve got complaints, questions, ideas etc… The renewal fee is £10pa, there will be a pro-rata payment for those who have became members within the last 12 months.

Competition – For advanced grades only, 11 years+

There is an English Karate Federation Kyu Grade Competition on Sunday 22nd January in Sheffield, the club has arranged a mini bus as transport (thanks to Hartlepool College of FE). Any students wanting to enter need to pay the relevant entry fees (& £10 transport cost) on Friday 6th January, No exceptions. I know this is short notice but the closing date is Saturday 7th. Download the full entry formfor information only, parents and students can not submit entries themselves, they must go through the club. If you have any questions about this then give me a call as soon as possible (07984 798634).

The above information should have been delivered to our members via email, if you didn’t receive yours then please contact us.

Last year was a very busy, but very successful year for the club with a very many people achieving their individual goals.

All of this was done thanks to the support of the club instructors, committee, volunteers and other support staff at the club. Most importantly though, it was down to the students (& their parents) buying into the strong work ethic at the club. Our students proved that through working hard you achieve results.

Before we re-start, I’d like our students to think about what they would like to achieve this year through training at the club. Do you have a goal weight to reach? Do you want to get the next belt? Learn the next kata? The next part of this is How are you going to achieve that goal? And how much time are you realistically going to be able to commit to achieving it?

We’ll be talking about this in more detail over the first few sessions of the year to see how we can help you.

2012 will be another good year with lots of great things planned.

I look forward to getting stuck back in to training from the 6th, see you all then…

In addition to the above dates, some other events might be added (e.g. British) depending upon squad commitment to training and ability. Competitors wanting to select for the Wadokai England Squad in 2012 should put ALL of the above dates into their diaries.

Those students ‘serious’ about competition should attend the weekly Squad Session (Wednesday 7-8pm).